7 Essential Skills for Photographers

So you want to be a professional photographer? Photography is a lot more than just being creative and pointing the camera and pressing your shutter. You need skills in various disciplines if you truly want to make it in this highly competitive industry. Today’s photographer has to be tech savvy as well as business savvy to outshine the competition.

In scanning various websites, speaking with colleagues, asking questions in forums, and my personal experience as a professional photographer, I have developed a list of essential skills that I highly suggest you adhere to if you want to be a successful photographer in today’s competitive world of “I have a dSLR, so I’m a photographer” photographers. It’s time to pull away for the, “it’s just good enough photos” and really make your mark and position yourself as a true professional. Carpe diem my friend!

The Skills You Need To Be A Successful Photographer:

Interpersonal or People Skills

It’s not just good enough to be a creative individual, but in today’s competitive photography market, you truly need to be able to work with people and work with them well. Set aside your artistic ego and put on your customer service hat. You are selling your services to people, not to a business or some inanimate object. People have feelings, they make decisions and referrals. They base their decision not just on the quality of your work, but on your attitude toward them and how you handled the photo session, client meeting, or telephone inquiry. Most of my non-commercial clients, meaning my portrait and wedding clients will choose me over the competition because, as the client tells me after the first meeting, “I felt we clicked and I like your attitude.”  So, when dealing with people, you need to be:

1. A good listener
2. Credible
3. Respectful
4. Flexible

 Know the Basics of Photography

For most new photographers, the basics is like asking them to what an 8-track tape is; “what’s that?” I mean, I’m not sure they understand what D76 or E6  chemistry is, let alone whatRVP50 might stand for.

Okay, I may be pushing it here with the technical terms, but if you want to succeed in photography, you really need to understand film. I know, I know, digital is so much easier and you get instant gratification by seeing the images on the cameras monitor and making adjustments on the fly, but you really need to understand film photography to truly appreciate digital photography. Get yourself an inexpensive camera, an SLR preferably, and hit the road by capturing some images on film. Learn the characteristics of the different films. By knowing film, you can be more creative in your photography, especially in post production. Alien Skin and a few other software companies make plug-in’s for Photoshop and Lightroom that do a decent job of emulating the look of film. But you first need to experience film to truly understand what you are doing.

It also wouldn’t hurt to take a few community college courses in photography where you have to actually photograph film and develop it. Work in the darkroom, manipulating images and you will grow to truly appreciate Photoshop and all that it can do a whole heck of a lot faster than the darkroom.

Let’s not forget composition. You may have a creative eye, but learn basic photographic composition. Once you understand this, then you can truly begin to break the rules in photography and begin to forge your own unique style. There’s a great book titled, “Photography” by Barbara London, Jack Upton, and Jim Stone. It’s a bit pricy, but covers everything from film to digital and everything in between. I highly recommend this text book for anyone serious about learning photography from the ground up.

Know the Principles of Lighting

This may be an understatement, but there are too many new photographers that just don’t have the grasp of lighting, how it works, and how to control it. Remember, photography is “writing with light”. Photos, meaning light and graphi (or graphy) means to write. (Both Greek words). “Photographers” nowadays rely on the histogram on their computers or just looking at the image to make lighting corrections. Understand the lighting principles such as the inverse square law as well as how aperture and shutter affect your lighting.

Learn to light your subject or scene and learn to control that light. By just knowing this, you will have advanced well beyond the competition. There is plenty of information out there on the web, including my blog here about lighting. If you prefer books, I recommend Christopher Greys, Master Lighting Guide for Portrait Photographers. This book covers 90% of lighting for portraits, it’s easy to read with lots of photos.

Know Your Equipment

I’ve seen it way too often, a young photographer takes out their camera, points, shoots, and looks at the monitor to approve what he or she just created, but they really don’t understand their equipment, their camera. Your camera comes with an owners manual, read it! Get to know your equipment and it’s limitation, including your lighting such as flashguns (flash units). Understand how the stuff works. if you don’t have an owners manual, google it! I’m certain you will find information about your make and model somewhere online, if not from the manufacturer.

Knowing your equipment is critical. It helps speed up your decision making process in situations where you need to think quickly such as a wedding or a news event. Plus, you will learn what you can’t and can do with what you have.

Patience and Flexibility

If you are not flexible or patient, then you are in the wrong business, especially if you are working with people. You need to understand that situations change and people can be moody. You may encounter a situation where the criteria for the shoot changes, especially if you are shooting a commercial shoot with clients who want to change the theme or message or working on shooting a wedding. Losing your patience and not being flexible can cost you future business. Remember my first essential skill? You need interpersonal and people skills!

Think Outside of the Box

This is not just a cliche, but a fact. Take a look at different photographers websites, you will notice a lot of photographers shooting a similar style, why would someone hire you then? Be different in your style. Don’t follow the crowed and just copy their styles, create your own photographic path and be different.

Having a special skill, or style will get you noticed. You will be known as the photographer who does creative and unique work. Following the crowed may get you some work, but it won’t sustain you for long unless you have a unique style.

Possess Marketing and Business Skills

You need to be business savvy these days. Just being creative and technically savvy is not enough. Knowing how to market yourself on and off-line is essential to your survival as a professional photographer. If you don’t get involved with your own marketing efforts, then you will starve as a photographer. You can learn this by visiting photographers forums, joining a professional photographers association, such as the PPA or from the book, Best Business Practices for Photographers, or other photography marketing books.

Knowing how SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and other online marketing tools work is essential, since a majority of potential clients search online for their photographers. In addition, know some traditional marketing methods, like postcard mailing is also essential. If you have the time, I would recommend that you enroll in a community college business and marketing course which can help you with not only marketing, but pricing your services.

 

These are essential skills, meaning the basic skills you need in order to succeed in today’s photography industry. There is a lot more to the field of photography than what’s here. However, mastering the above seven essential skills for photographers will place you ahead of your competition and perhaps some money in your pockets. If you have any other suggestions for essential skills, I would certainly like to hear them form you in the comments.